Of Lipstick, Nylons and Invitations
by algie888
Summary: Susan was called up for an obituary regardless. It was a sea of black to greet her, people everywhere were crying. She rose to the dais, the podium too painted coal black, and a smatter of condensation dripped like tears. Even the objects were in mourning for them. COMPLETE


**A/N: I'm back in Narnia, boys. This is probably the darkest thing I have ever written, and probably the most controversial I ever will. It's got very dark views on religion, so if that makes you uncomfortable, I don't recommend reading it. Mind the rating, too. It's rather violent. This was inspired by the response to Neil Gaiman's _'The Problem with Susan'._**

* * *

Truth to be told, Susan much preferred boyfriend's father more than she did David himself. It occurred to her the day she met the old man at his country home, with his twinkling eyes and childish smile that rang so much of how Lucy always did. Mr. Jack, the kind author with the soul of a child, offered her several pastries, despite how many times she told him that she was dieting. It was this sort of stubborn demeanor Mr. Jack had that drew her to him, as though he was reminding her of how she had been as a child, despite the fact she was considerably younger than he was.

Susan opened the door a crack, glancing around the room to see if it was occupied. David was out at another boxing match, doubtlessly going to arrive home bloodied and with a broken pride for her to nurse back to health. Until then, Susan was to hold the fort at his house, eagerly awaiting his return.

The library was seemingly empty, so she slipped in through the open door and into the musty room. Edmund would have loved this house, with all its winding staircases and collections of priceless books. It reminded Susan so much of that house the four of them had stayed in so many years ago, but memories of the place were fuzzy. All she could remember was the hot and lazy summer sun on her skin, the smashing of a window, and a startling interest in archery - which she had not dared to touch since in fear of appearing too masculine. Men did not like it when a woman was stronger than them.

Susan pulled out the romantic novel she had hidden amongst the shelves of dusty books, the glossy cover and penguin logo a stark contrast against the hardcover russet tones and faded dust jackets. She sat down on the plush armchair, the soft purple material sagging under her weight.

"Ah, I was wondering whether you would be here," said a voice, and Susan's head snapped upwards to stare at the chair across from her. Mr. Jack was sitting across from her, his dark green suit almost blending in with the deep green corduroy chair. "I didn't frighten you too badly, did I?"

"Simply caught me unawares," Susan defended, nestling down again. She noticed that Mr. Jack had a variety of papers strewn about his lap, and an open notebook beside him. He must be attempting to write that novel, Susan realised.

A few moments of comfortable silence passed between them, the quiet only punctuated by the turning of Susan's pages, and the exasperated sighs coming from Mr. Jack.

Finally, Mr. Jack took off his spectacles, and ran a hand down his face with an expression of defeat. Susan looked up curiously, glancing at his papers. He had not written a word since she had entered, merely crossing out several paragraphs in a scarlet pen.

"Are you having trouble writing the book, sir?" Susan asked, cocking her head to the side curiously. She had never known that writing something as trivial as fiction could be difficult - it always appeared to be something a flighty, oppressed woman would do in her spare time.

"Yes," he said sadly. "I just cannot seem to wrap my head around a child's manner," he explained.

Susan nodded consolingly, thinking of Lucy. "Children do have rather odd ways of thinking," she said, smiling slightly. "My siblings are prime examples of that."

Mr. Jack smiled at her kindly, and then paused over his papers. "Susan," he began cautiously, as though she would flee like a scared animal. "You are young. Not more than twenty, surely."

Susan laughed, beaming at him. "Oh, no," she said, "twenty one, sir. But you were very close."

"I can't be right all the time," Mr. Jack said cheekily, sending Susan a grin that seemed far too young for his age.

"Why, sir?" she asked, and then hurriedly corrected herself. "Why did you want to know my age, I mean."

Mr. Jack smiled at her again. "I wanted to know whether you could help me," he said, shrugging. "But you would probably be far too busy."

"Oh, no!" Susan said, leaning forwards. "I would love to help you. What are you struggling with, sir? I'd be glad to help."

Mr. Jack glanced at her over the tops of his spectacles. "The novel," he said, pointing at the collection of papers. "I need someone who can understand children, and you, with four siblings, seem the perfect candidate."

Susan was not good with fiction, nor was she good with children. In fact, ever since she had returned from her trip to America (an utterly amazing experience) her siblings had avoided her altogether. "I'm sorry, sir, but I doubt I could help with that," she offered sadly. At the disappointed look on Mr. Jack's face, one that she could tell he had attempted to hide, something tugged at Susan's gentle soul. "Although," she said slowly, unsure of whether it was a good idea, "I could try."

Mr. Jack beamed at her with such emotion that Susan thought she would hug him just there. "Oh, truly?" he asked, sounding like a child that had been promised an ice cream. "Oh, thank you, Susan. Thank you."

"Might I," she began meekly, unsure of where the man had attained this level of exuberance, "might I know what genre you were looking for?" She prayed it was something remotely fact based, so that she would not feel too much like a fish out of water. History, if she were extremely lucky.

"Oh," Mr. Jack said, looking up from where he had begun to scrawl something across the lined paper. "Oh, yes. Fantasy, dear," he informed her, and Susan stifled a shriek. "Other worlds, mystical powers, good triumphing over evil."

Susan forced her lips into a thin line, and nodded stiffly. "I'll see what I can do, sir. Could I perhaps ask my siblings for ideas? Imagination was never my strong point."

Mr. Jack was not paying attention to her, he was too busy planning out something in his calendar. "Hmmm? Oh, of course you may," he responded absently.

Susan turned, sensing that Mr. Jack was no longer interested in talking. His moods swung like that on occasion, and Susan had long since grown used to it. As she left the room, a maid came up to her holding a black telephone on a silver platter. "It's for you, ma'am," she whispered, holding up the receiver.

Susan frowned, and placed the phone next to her ear. "Hello? This is Susan Pevensie, may I know who is speaking?"

"This is Sergeant Donovan, of the Metropolitan Police. Ma'am, I'm so sorry," said the Sergeant through the phone. "There was a train crash, this morning. I am so sorry for your loss..."

* * *

Truth be told, Susan did not want to be at the funeral. She wanted to fall down and cry. She wanted to burn all the items presented to her in the will. She wanted to curse herself for being the worst sibling ever. The worst cousin, in Eustace's case.

If there truly was a god, a deity, some sort of mystic power, then it was sick. It was twisted. At the funeral, the holy man there comforted her, told her that they were in Heaven, and that they were loved. She didn't like that, not one bit. She had actually argued against the man.

"If this 'God' of yours truly loves us," she said, her voice shrilly. She was drunk from the cheap wine they had served her. "If He truly wants us to be happy, why does he do this?"

The man told him that God worked in mystic ways. She told him where to put these 'mystic ways'.

Susan was called up for an obituary regardless. It was a sea of black to greet her, people everywhere were crying. She rose to the dais, the podium too painted coal black, and a smatter of condensation dripped like tears. Even the objects were in mourning for them.

She, from her vantage point above the crowd, could see all who had turned up. Anne Featherstone, one of Lucy's dear friends. Peter's rugby team stood to one side in ill fitting suits. Aunt Alberta was crying as though tears were running out. Jill's mother sobbed next to her, the two comforting each other. Edmund's girlfriend stood by the back, tears leaking from her eyes.

She licked her lips, and realised that her mind had gone blissfully blank. There was nothing to talk about. There would never be anything to talk about again.

She left the podium untended, shaking her head at the crowd. Susan could not do it. She could never talk ever again. She never wanted to talk ever again.

* * *

She dreamt of what she had told the holy man. About gods. She dreamt that Zeus came down from Olympus to punish her, and Jupiter struck her down with a lightning bolt. She was imprisoned next to Loki, a serpent dripping poison onto her face. Except the poison smelled of her favourite perfume, and Loki was not being tormented. He was laughing at her, laughing at her misery.

She dreamt a lion stole her away in the night, rescuing her. It took her away from the mocking trickster god, from the snake, from the gods. He placed her down in a clearing, and nodded to her politely. Susan was glad that politeness was no longer dead.

"As I said," the lion rumbled. Susan was not particularly surprised it could talk. "Once a king or queen, always a king or queen."  
Susan said nothing to him.

"You needed me more than the rest of them ever did. More than even Edmund needed me. You were too sensible, daughter of Eve, to not need Narnia."

Narnia is a dream. She told him as much.

The lion laughed at her, and shook its golden mane. She recalled his name was Aslan, and that hers was Susan.

"I did not need Narnia," she argued, feeling like she knew what Narnia was. "Nor do I need it now. You claimed my siblings. Where are they now?"

"In Narnia."

"If you truly loved them, if you truly loved me, then you would not have taken them," she said to him, feeling very calm all of a sudden, like the air before a storm. "Narnia addicted them. Narnia took them away from me. You killed those you claimed to love, Aslan!" Susan was screaming now, her voice ripping her vocal chords. "I did not outgrow Narnia, I escaped it!"

The lion pounced.

* * *

Truth be told, Susan did not particularly like the zoo. At all. So why Jonathan (her new boyfriend - David had become increasingly annoying) was taking her there, she had no idea.

"But it'll be lovely, Su!" Jonathan cried, leading her in through the gate. "All the animals to see, and there's a small petting park, and plenty of food!" Jonathan sighed when he noticed she was barely listening to him."Oh, come on, Susan, please!"

Susan realised that Jonathan too was becoming increasingly annoying. "I'm not in the mood, Jon," she hissed, wrenching her arm from his grip. "Please, I just want to go home."

"You spend far too much time sulking in that flat. They're gone, Su," he told her kindly. "You have to accept that."

Susan ignored him, and strolled straight into the zoo. She managed to lose him in a crowd when he stopped to re-tie his laces, which she had craftily stepped on so that they came undone. The second she could no longer see his obnoxious orange shirt, she raced for the exit, which led her past several more exhibits. She ran through the beaver cages, and the otter ponds, swiftly ignoring the aviary and bears, and slowed to a stop just when she saw the exit, her shoes pinching at her feet. Before she could leave, there was one more enclosure she had to pass, and she did so slowly in order to catch her breath. It was not until she had almost completely left the enclosure did she see what animal was being kept there. It was a lion, with a magnificent golden mane and tawny eyes. The second Susan saw it, the beast opened its mouth, letting out a terrifying roar.

Susan screamed.

She ran straight out of the zoo, racing past the ticketing booth until she hit the main road, where she signalled a taxi hastily.

The cabbie did not comment when she started to sob in the backseat, their only exchange being of money.

She flung herself into her room, shutting the door behind her with a resounding bang that would ensure one of her neighbours to complain. Susan didn't care. She simply sank to her knees, her back pressed against the door as the sobs wracked her body and tears stained her face.

* * *

"You forgot us," they hissed at her, their voices rippling over one another like waves crashing with force in a sea. "You forgot all of us."

"What did I forget?" she asked, "why do I hurt?" For she did hurt, and it felt like pain, like ultimatum and doomsday. Then they laughed at her, mocking her, copying her voice in a falsetto.

In rolled a body bag, the same one she had seen when called in to identify her brothers' hacked and mangled faces. The voices stopped, and Susan opened the bag impulsively, even though her mind screamed at her to stop. It was Edmund, his blue eyes unseeing, his black hair stained with blood. The filmy eyes watched her as she recoiled from the moving corpse. Edmund sat up, wearing nothing but some sort of fur coat - lion fur. Peter loped up to her, wearing the exact same thing around him. Lucy screamed when the real lion pounced, crushing her tiny, dead body in its huge jaws. The lion seemed happy. He had always preferred Lucy to all of them.

Peter smiled at her, and clapped her shoulder. It stained her shoulder with blood.

* * *

Truth be told, Susan disliked any form of writing. So, the fact she sat at a desk with a pen in hand was almost like a mystery to her. Someone had told her that writing was very good for relieving stress, apparently very therapeutic for those who needed a form of release. Susan pressed the nib of the pen hard into her paper, the ink forming a blossom of black that leaked across the page.

Susan turned to the side, pressing her cheek to the cool wood of the desk. Her mind was blissfully blank. She reached into her pocket, and pulled out the half empty packet of cigarettes, shaking out one into her hand. Susan lit it lazily, and let the smoke envelope her in its coils. She sighed as she began to get a light buzz from it, her eyes pricking uncomfortably.

Susan glanced at the photo of the four siblings, sitting on a row of chairs with smiling faces. It had been taken at the Kirke's home, on the day they were to leave. There was something about the way the boys held themselves in that picture that always confused her. Edmund's back was ramrod straight, however he seemed perfectly relaxed about it, as though the angle he sat at was not at all uncomfortable. Peter's chin was lifted to gaze above them all, like a king surveying his kingdom. Lucy seemed different too. Older, almost. Susan just seemed normal.

Blowing out a puff of smoke, she picked up the pen again. _Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy. _

She scratched out the names again. That would never do. Far too personal, and the last thing she wanted was to be personal, because that would hurt her, and she would bleed.

Peter she would keep for a name. Susan would become Ann, after Lucy's best friend. In turn, Lucy would be Rose, after Edmund's young beau that continuously called on Susan for comfort. Ed would be named after father - Martin.

She tried again. _This story is about something that happened to them when they were sent away from London during the war because of air-raids. They were sent to the house of an old Professor who lived in the heart of the country, ten miles from the nearest railway station and two miles from the nearest post office._

A slow smile crossed Susan's face, and she continued to write, her only company the sound of the fire crackling merrily away.

* * *

"Why didn't Ann return to Narnia?" asked Mr. Jack, raising his snow white eyebrows. "Surely the fact that her siblings died was enough to change the fact she outgrew it."

Susan shook her head. "Ann grew up," she argued. "Ann is every child, every little conceited child that dresses up in mummy's shoes."

"But Narnia is perfect, surely that would change her mind," retorted Mr. Jack. "Surely, once she died, she would return?"

Susan sighed, and turned her head to the side, not wanting to look at the man she had admired so greatly not two months beforehand. Mr. Jack, like all people, was not perfect. He had his blind spots, and Susan had hers. "Ann was acting the way any young girl would. The way anyone would."

"Perhaps she forgot Narnia," mused Mr. Jack. "Surely, if she remembered it, she would long to go back."

Susan bit her lip, and glanced down at the several manuscripts that lay before her, the words printed in her hand. "Perhaps. Or perhaps she didn't want to go back," she added.

"Why would you not want to go back?" he asked, raising his eyebrows. "It is perfection. Narnia is everything we don't have, but better." Mr. Jack smiled at her, "do you think she thought herself not worthy?"

"Maybe," Susan admitted. "Or, maybe she didn't want to believe in a silly fairy tale."

"That's cold, Susan," he admonished. "Ann would have wanted to be with her siblings, in the better place."

"How would you know?" she asked, her tone verging on a snarl. "Narnia is a dream land, Mr. Jack. It would do ill to take it seriously."

"It would do ill for you not to, Susan," he answered. The silence between them was full of tension, and Susan recognised the feeling of an itch in her hand, the one that called for her to load her bow.

"I was thinking of changing their names," said Mr. Jack. "And whether you'd like a cut of the profit."

"It's just a story I made up," Susan said, standing. "Do whatever you want with it, I do not care."

"And the money?"

She bit her lip, and turned around. Greed, that was a sin, wasn't it? "Fifty-fifty, no less," she said, and left the room.

* * *

Edmund was kissing her. Not a simple peck on the cheek, but kissing her the way her boyfriends did when they were drunk. He tasted of Turkish Delight and sin. Susan pushed him away, snarling at him. He merely smirked.

Peter put his arms around her, and Lucy sat on her lap happily. They were enticing, and enchanting, trying to woo her in any ways possible. Edmund had her lipstick on - or was that his blood?

* * *

Susan married a banker by the name of Gerald. They had two children, a boy and a girl, named Penelope and Francis. One miscarriage two years later - she never truly got over seeing Baby-Alice bloody and unmoving. She then cheated on Gerald with Frank, a young boy in the Navy. All of them were amazed when they heard that she was Susan Pevensie, from the books.

Susan smiled down at Francis, who had just begun to grow out of his childish lisp. "What is it, Franny?"

"Who are Edmund, Lucy and Peter?" he asked, his voice high and shrill, like Lucy's. "Only Johnny and Matt said they were your brothers and sister. Are you really a Queen?"

"They are your uncles and auntie," she said, her kind smile flickering. Penelope called for her from the kitchen.

"Can we meet them?" he asked, excitedly.

"No," she said bluntly, "they're not with us any more."

"Like Baby-Alice?" he asked. Despite the fact he was seven, he could never shake the memory of Susan returning home with red eyes and toys for both of them. There was a bed no one slept in, and Baby-Alice watched him always. Angel Alice.

"Yes," she answered. "Like Baby-Alice."

"Can we see them again?" he asked, cocking his head to the side. "Can we go to where they are one day?"  
Susan smirked, and stood. "You will, Franny."

* * *

Susan stood at Penelope's wedding, watching her kiss her husband. Named Peter - how delightful. She glanced around at the walls, taking in the impaled Christ. She narrowed her eyes at him, unable to look away.

Susan did not like God. She did not like Aslan, did not like Buddha, did not like Allah. Whatever god, deity, or power up there was disgusting, and she had said this before. Aslan had cast her out for liking to dress up. Aslan had scorned her for growing up, for exploring.

Whichever God made her trek through the rain to a mortuary to determine whether it was Peter that had his face smashed in by the incoming train, whether it was Lucy that had glass shards embedded in her pretty face, whether it was Jill and Eustace holding hands, whether it was Digory with the impaled trachea, whether it was Polly with the decapitated head, whether it was Edmund who had been rammed through by a piece of debris.

Whichever deity had made her do that did not deserve to be a God.


End file.
